It’s been a long time since I was on the job market, but it was certainly disheartening how low the response ratio was.
I must have sent out 40 applications for every response, even an acknowledgement of receipt was rare.
I’ve been through this as well. I went through a stage where I could have multiple job interviews in a week, sometimes on the same day.
I could tell it was the end of the month because recruiters would start calling, and even in the middle of the month after job ads had been up for two weeks.
Then when you do progress a step employers want you to jump through more hoops than ever now. And they’re surprised when you push back because you either still have work or other things going on. I’m not going to give a business free labour on the off chance they hire me, I’ll do your exercises for you when I’m getting paid.
And all the platforms you need to sign up for. I use a password manager and some software shares the same URL, but accounts are separate. You either use a bunch of different passwords and can never tell which is which, or compromise yourself by using the same one over and over.
I know the applicant tracking platforms by look now, and I can tell which I can apply through easily and which will have problems with the way my resume is formatted. Some of the worst software I’ve ever used, the industry as a whole.
